Australian Bank Fees
Monthly Bank Fees
Many Australian Banks have account keeping fees, commonly $5 per month, although some are Free, so it is worth shopping around.
HSBC Bank Australia was a common account for many newly arrived British, as it can provide FREE banking, and a decent interest rate on deposits.
The National Australia Bank (NAB) was the first to offer Free transaction accounts for customers without requiring minimum balances or regular salary deposits as a condition for free banking.
ATM Bank Fees
The normal fee for ATM transactions, when using an ATM from a bank other than your own, is $1.50 to $2 per transaction.
Most ATM transactions will incur fees, unless you ONLY use an ATM that belongs to your bank.
The fee that you are charged when you use an ATM that is not operated by your own bank is called a “Foreign Transaction Fee”, or “Other bank ATM Fee”.
Transaction fees may be charged on “Balance Enquiry”, “Withdrawal” and “Deposits”.
As from 2009, most of these fees will be shown on the ATM screen, before you choose to finalise the transaction thereby allowing you to abort, if you do not wish to pay the fee.
Some banks have agreements with other banks, so that they do NOT get charged a “Foreign Transaction Fee”. Examples of these are:
- HSBC account holders can use Westpac ATM’s – www.hsbc.com.au
- St George Bank account holders can use Westpac and BankSA ATM’s – stgeorge.com.au
- Bank West account holders can use CBA ATM’s – www.bankwest.com.au
- NAB account holders have fee-free access to Rediteller network ATMs
- Bendigo account holders can use Suncorp bank ATMs without incurring an operator fee.
- Suncorp account holders can use Bendigo bank ATMs without incurring an operator fee.
Following the RBA involvement, bank customers must, from March 3rd, 2009, be notified of the charges before making a transaction at another bank’s ATM, and then given the opportunity to opt out of the transaction without being charged.
However, it appears that some banks, including NAB, Westpac, St George and ANZ have all announced smaller extra fees which will NOT be shown on the ATM screen at the time of the transaction.
Some of the above banks may have recently decided not to impose these fees. It would be best to double check, as things are changing rapidly at the moment.
Only the fee being charged by the ATM operator will be shown, at the time of the transaction, on the ATM screen. The Card owners own bank fees will NOT be shown.
ATM Fees by ATM Operator
| Balance Enquiry | Withdrawal Fee | Bank |
|---|---|---|
| ? | $2.00 | ANZ |
| ? | $2.00 | Bank Of Queensland |
| ? | $2.00 | Bankwest |
| ? | $2.00 | Commonwealth Bank |
| ? | $2.00 | Heritage |
| ? | $2.00 | NAB |
| ? | $2.50 | Rediteller ATM |
| ? | $2.00 | St George |
| ? | $2.50 | Suncorp |
| ? | $2.00 | Westpac |
| ? | $2.00 | Cashcard ATM |
Be aware of Bank advertising that may lead you to believe that you will pay nothing….
I have seen one bank advertising “No charge for ‘bank name’ customers when they use Foreign ATMs – 13 March 2009″.
However, further down in smaller print, it does say: “customers will not be charged “disloyalty fees” for using “Foreign ATMs”, although they could still be charged a “Direct Charge” by the ATM operator”